Veil Hopping
by skyflyte12
Summary: It all went up the SNAFU the day Idiot Man rugby-tackled poor little me through the freaky veil in the Department of Mysteries. HP/Onepiece, fem!Harry
1. Chapter 1

Veil Hopping

Chapter 1

•±¥±•

Magic, she decided, was not good for ones life expectancy.

Oh, most people would respond to this thought with shock and horror – she could hear it now…

"What do you _mean_ it's not good for your life? Why, just the wave of a wand and you can get anywhere you want in an instant, or have your food cook itself, or have all the household cleaning done on top of that! Well, sure, there may be the few drawbacks of dementors, dragons and other such inconveniences, but magic rules all and solves all problems!"

The funny thing is, her original statement doesn't even begin to take into account the additional dangers of the so-called 'Creatures of the Dark' – the problem is that magic does very bad things to ones survival skills.

A wizard without a wand would sooner wither up and die than do such _menial_ tasks as cooking their own breakfast or packing their own clothes – they wouldn't know _how_ to cook without the carrots slicing themselves and the pots boiling water and whatnot; their houses would be dirty and their clothes would be unwashed within hours.

There might be some validity in the counter argument that magic allows a wizard to expect to live for up to 150 years – but think about it a moment. Just how many 150 year old people do wizards see in Diagon Alley? The answer is 'none' – unless Albus Dumbledore decides to go to Gringotts – and there is one simple reason as to why this is: they are all extremely large and/or frail from sitting around all day, using magic to get what they want while they spend the time yelling at their descendents, most of them going fairly insane on top of that (just take Sirius' mother as an example). After all, there is a _reason_ that most Purebloods don't invite people home – they'd have to contend with the crotchety old people holed up in the living room.

Aiden eyed the man that was sprawled across the deck of the boat in front of her with something akin to contempt, them having landed on said vessel through some random stroke of luck. Aiden didn't know anything about said man other than the fact that he was a Death Eater and had pushed her through the Veil in the Department of Mysteries by tackling her from behind.

The wizard, who Aiden had mentally dubbed 'Idiot Man', had proceeded to try to curse her once they had landed, but Aiden had been able to fight back. Problem was, during the not-so-epic scuffle that had resulted, Idiot Man had managed to throw both their wands overboard.

She found herself relieved that her glasses probably had enough charms on 'em to survive through a Nuclear Bomb, otherwise she would have been in deep shit – what with the 'not being able to see more than the fuzzy ambience without them' thing.

Yeah, _anyways_, you do see where this is going, right?

Well, they had been stuck on said _abandoned_ – she _did _mention that there was no one on said ship, right? – boat for oh, nigh on three hours now, and Idiot Man was apparently on the verge of suicide. He had been tossing around words like 'doomed for eternity' and 'kill me, kill me, oh Merlin, please kill me' for the past two hours.

Aiden found it vaguely amusing, in an I-would-kill-you-if-I-had-a-weapon-on-me-and-could-be-bothered kind of way.

Right about now would usually be the time that she revealed her super-mad wandless magic skills, right? Well, so far they weren't showing up.

She was pretty sure that they were non-existent as well.

So no help from that quarter.

She was drumming her fingers against the wood, amusing herself with guessing how much time it would take for Idiot Man to off himself or jump ship.

Fortunately for her, she was not a normal witch. And no, this had absolutely nothing to do with that stupid Girl-Who-Lived moniker. No, her 'mad awesome skills' were the fact that she had a little thing that (as far as she was concerned) was all that separated the muggles from the wizards – Common Sense (and can't you just taste the paradox?). Sure, most muggleborn wizards and witches have it as well, but only before being brainwashed into becoming wizarding sheep, irretrievably losing that fabled ability.

Well, that and a little thing she tagged as 'survival skills', which she personally defined as the ability to look after oneself in adverse circumstances.

Yes, Aiden Potter had been practising the art of survival skills from an obnoxiously early age, courtesy of the Dursleys, and it was in situations such as these that she actually felt that they deserved a quick and painless death, instead of her usual month-long 'oh god, kill me now' excruciating torture-before-the-act deal that she usually felt they deserved and had wished for. Oh sure, as a child (in this case the ages 3-7) she had wished for someone to pick her up to love her, but later she revised her opinion and decided that they had to suffer and preferably die before she went.

But enough of those cheerful thoughts: the thing to focus on was that she knew how to keep herself alive in undesirable circumstances, and she had a fair resistance to starvation and depravation – not like Idiot Man, whose stomach sounded like it was eating itself from the missed lunch.

While Idiot Man had gone into shock at the realisation that he had just lost the one thing that could have kept him alive and in a relatively good condition, she had gotten up and had a look at the 'ship' that they were stuck on – it was little more than a deck, cabin and a big-ish room in the hull. She had found a stock of rum and a bit of food that could hold up against expiring for a while, as well as a map in what had undoubtedly been the captain's cabin and a few books (written in another language, so no help there) and last but not least, clean water and a latrine. She was pleased to note that the food would last her, if she cut portions down to a little bit more than what she got at the Dursley's, for at least two weeks.

There may or may not have been locks on the doors and such, but she could state in complete innocence that whoever had put them on would have done a better job (the locks were practically primitive!) had they expected to keep people out. Really, there was a reason the Dursleys had checked her cupboard every night for anything that might be used as a pick – she had to learn to pick locks in order to get food when she was desperate from a young age – Giraffe-woman had often commented that she must have been 'Bloody Harry Houdini' in a former life. They, of course, put it down to mad 'freakish skills' but it wasn't – she had come to believe that the strongest force on this planet was a desire to piss off ones (borderline criminally negligent) guardians.

After reassuring herself that she wouldn't have to float aimlessly without rations for an unspecified amount of time, she had settled down and puzzled over the incomprehensible map (to her) and some on-boat entertainment.

Since Idiot Man was a Death Eater and solely responsible for this elaborate mess, Aiden had already decided that the man would suffer. Hell no was she giving food to the bastard that got her into this mess! She could have quite happily gone the rest of her life being 'manipulated' by ol' Dumbells and his Order of the Flaming Turkey.

_Really_, just look like a poor starved and naïve child and they think you don't notice that a _stupid_ troll somehow randomly breaks into the _safest_ place in 'The World' without warning and _somehow_ the teachers don't know _exactly _where it is (when they know the _second_ that you curse a red nose, antlers and a loop of Christmas carols onto Malfoy) and three _first years_ somehow beat it with something as stupid as a club to the head… _really._ Not to mention that the 'safeguards' against _Voldemort_ (supposed 'best-wizard-this-century') didn't stop three determined first years?

Anyone who couldn't see that is an utter moron.

Fortunately, all you have to do is slip past your two guard dogs and go talk to people from different houses to suddenly regain private conversations (wow! What a privilege!) and ask them to borrow books out for you. Even telephone the muggleborns to keep 'in the know' in the wizarding world – it's so simple!

Psh, Dumbells is an idiot. Aiden had always known the man was a manipulative old coot, but the best way to avoid him and slip 'under the radar' as it were, was to pretend that you are completely oblivious to the fact that your stuttering Defence Professor has a face sticking out of the back of his head and that said 'Twinkledork' has _absolutely_ no idea what happens in your home life. It's just easier, because then you can get away with transferring your (illegal) Tracking charms to the broken television set in your room and slip off to meet up with Eliza Moon, Blaise Zabini, Anthony Goldstein and Susan Bones at the (curiously unmentioned) teen hangout of the Wizarding World that is strangely named the 'Creaks District' for some reason. Said district is also the place that underage wizards and witches go to use magic freely – muggleborns are often directed there so that they could keep in practise during the holidays.

So, it was an exchange of sorts – Aiden played the naïve and trusting kid, and Dumbledore played the concerned grandfather, and they got along wonderfully. Aiden even got to enjoy watching Dumbells frustration when she 'couldn't solve' the latest puzzle and thus had to be given a clue as unsubtle as oh… the disappearance of her 'best mates' sister, or the forced entry into the Triwizard Tournament. Huh! He even had Dobby complete the clue about the Room of Requirement when it seemed that Aiden hadn't 'solved it'.

Well, look where it had gotten her.

Stuck on a ship with a Death Eater that was probably less harmful than a new-born kitten at the moment and out in the middle of nowhere, on what amounts to a floating pile of logs. To add to her troubles, the map that she had unearthed was written on in another language and didn't match her understanding of (her admittedly rather fuzzy) muggle _or_ magical geography lessons.

Just. Brilliant.

Aiden sighed and tilted her head to stare up at the clouds that were floating lazily past.

She decided not to ponder on how his situation could get worse.

•±¥±•

It had been a full three days and four hours since Idiot Man had landed them wherever they were and there had been no indication that the world consisted of anything other than water. Oh, and sun – couldn't forget that. Stupid sunburn. Stupid weather. Stupid life.

So far, the weather had been like Dumbledore – Aiden could just _tell_ that it was trying to lull her into a false sense of security before it turned around and destroyed everything. Sigh.

So far, Idiot Man had become what equated to her mental image of a victim of the Dementor's kiss – he just sat there, and only twitched when you poked him in the eye. She got this weird 'vibe' from him that lead her to suspect he was doing something with his magic – her latest guess was some kind of induced 'coma' to stop him from either snapping or to enable him to live through the experience – it didn't really bother her too much either way.

Hell, with her zip knowledge on this, he coulda snapped already with this being the result.

At least it was something to poke for entertainment, because you know all those cool adventure stories you hear about involving travelling by sea? Yeah, _sounds_ great in theory, but in practise… let's just say that being stuck on a floating hunk of wood in the middle of nowhere and with a brain-dead Idiot Man sitting around, and with no idea if this particular voyage was going to end in three hours, three days or three months… can someone say monotonous and yet scarily frightening at the same time? What was she supposed to do if it sprung a leak? Or if some kind of sea monster (heaven forbid) decided that it was lunch time, and that Aiden à la BBQ was on the menu?

Either way, the future wasn't looking all that bright.

She had taken to jogging around out of sheer boredom, as well as stretching and whatever else popped into her mind. She admitted that it was quite possible that this was a new manifestation of her burgeoning insanity, but almost anyone who had come into contact with her knew that it would have happened sooner or later – there _was_ a reason that the Dork Lord was drawn to kill her that night after all… the saying 'like attracts like' comes to mind readily. Just to qualify, we are talking about the 'insanity' factor in that, not the homicidal maniac factor… even if you are likely to have a few people agree on that with you.

She sighed for what would have to be the thousandth time in the last three days. If only the weather or whatever else would just go shitty already – it was the waiting that was killing her!

Something moved out of the corner of her eye, and she span around only to hear the very distinctive sound of fabric tearing. Her eyes zeroed in on the only thing on this thing that had fabric – Idiot Man. She approached him warily, but realised that his expression hadn't changed at all, nor had he moved from the position of a letter 'S' that she had skilfully arranged him into on the second day out of sheer boredom (with the handicap of not being able to touch him with her hands, just to make it interesting).

She easily noticed what disturbance had caused the sound – roughly where the left pocket of his robes had been now was a (clearly muggle) dufflebag. Her brow knitted – that had obviously been caused by magic, but she knew that neither of them would have been able to perform it, even _if_ Idiot had been conscious. She approached, rather warily, and snatched up a stick that she had found in the 'captain's cabin' as she had mentally dubbed the tiny room and poked the bag.

When the stick did not catch fire and die, she examined Idiot a little more closely. She now saw the large tear through the flimsy fabric, covering his hip down to his knees (thankfully he had on pants and a top underneath, even _if_ they wouldn't have even been fashionable in the 1920's) and that led Aiden to the conclusion that it had been under a shrinking charm – those things never held for long without some kind of anchor.

She grabbed the bag and found it to be light (no doubt attributed to some kind of lightweight charm) and carried it over to the relative shade that could be found against the side of the cabin.

She sat down and looked at the flap that would open the bag and reveal the contents within, enjoying the familiar feeling of something catching her curiosity and holding her attention for the first time in what felt like ages.

Unable to stay still for a moment longer, she gleefully opened the bag and unzipped it. Staring into it, she could see that it was one of those 'unlimited space' deals. Really, she should probably have cared more about essentially routing through someone else's stuff, especially when said person sat just a few metres from her, but she felt more cheated at the shitty contents of the bag.

It held no cool magical objects (unless you count the broken sneak-o-scope) nor did it hold any _good_ food (sea rations sucked) or anything else that could have taken away some of the mindless boredom. Would it kill the dude to have a gameboy or something?

Yes, the bag was filled to the brim with dry, old-ish and complicated _books_. On a list of things you could possibly want to get out of the blue while stuck on a ship in the middle of the ocean, they would be right down there with 'diarrhoea', 'caught in a tsunami' and 'a hole in the bottom of said block of floating wood' for her.

So, dry books to her were about as welcome here as Voldemort would be to a children's birthday party, even if he brought the cake. And a circus. And a pony. In summary – Not At All.

Scanning over some of the titles, it was worse than she had even initially feared – hell, there weren't even some crappy romance novels in the lot – it was all dry facts about 'runes' and 'the art of warding' and '1001 spells that the ministry _wishes_ you didn't know'.

…Well, that last one would have been awesome, but OH she _forgot_ that she didn't have a freaking _wand_ anymore! Too bad that book has just about zero use now.

She scowled as she looked at the titles of dry intellectual book after dry intellectual book – just what the hell kind of place was this guy at before being 'summoned' to the Ministry shindig to be toting around all these crappy books?

As she idly scanned a book titled 'Wards: Fuck with them wrong and Die' after seeing a few rune dictionaries and translating guides, she found a piece of parchment in the middle of a book titled 'Wards for the Mentally Ineffectual' that was written on in a messy scrawl.

Curious, she removed it and examined it. After turning the paper this-way and that in an attempt to better decipher the script, she made out the words before realising it read:

'_Idiot. Yes, it is I – the arguably stupider person in this outfit who _voluntarily_ took you on as an apprentice. Do. Not. Loose. My. Books. If you loose my books, I will _(*content altered because of its excessively violent nature*)_ …and your descendant's decedents will feel it. I can promise you that. Do not wreak my books, do not write on my books, do not breathe on my books. Hell, why don't you just take this book and sit in a corner and _study it_. Like an __apprentice_ _is supposed to. Apparently, five years of studying Runes has done nothing to alleviate your idiocy or incompetency in the subject. Runes and Warding are not subjects for those who do not have two brain cells to rub together. Either visit St Mungos and check in or get another profession before either the job kills you or I do. That said, if you can manage to scrape together the prerequisite number of cells _and_ manage to hold onto them, there are books in here that will allow you to study from the green-horn you are now to someone as intelligent, brilliant and all-round awesome guy as me. Not that I'm making any promises. You are pretty hopeless, after all. So, these are my orders for the next three weeks that I will be absent for: Study. LEARN SOMETHING. Grow a brain (if at all possible). AND, for God Sakes; __DO NOT LOSE MY BOOKS__!'_

_-YOUR Very Angry Rune Master, NH'_

Aiden whistled at the note – whoever wrote that was someone worth getting tips from in the threatening department – that even scared her a little bit, and this was a tirade written on paper, not even directed at her! Not even the 'Snape Glare of Impending Doom' or the 'McGonagall Stern Frown of Disapproval' held that much water with her when she was suffering from face-to-face exposure! She was a little in awe of the person who could write such good threats, and also a little (the teeniest tiniest bit) sympathetic for the dude lying insensate on the floor.

Fortunately, the moment of weakness passed and she remembered the reason that this dude would probably be looking over his shoulder for the rest of his life – Idiot Man (it _was_ nice to know that someone agreed with her) was the _reason_ that he would never give the books back, not to mention that she was stuck on the ocean thinking about Voldemort wearing a tutu to a children's birthday party having made the cake and presenting it while singing a heartfelt rendition of 'Happy Birthday' while sucking on lemon drops.

Yes, she was fairly sure that the words 'mentally unstable' were probably left in the dust a while back – that disconcerting image of ballerina Voldemort would surely qualify her as a resounding and concrete representation of the mentally Insane.

But she had long ago accepted the harsh reality – 'sanity' was a label to be discarded as necessary – look what it did for Al… ok, er To… hmm. There's gotta be a good representation of the embodiment of that philosophy. Somewhere. Right?

Ok, she was deluding herself.

Calmly gathering up the shards of her sanity, Aiden glanced at the dry intellectual books that had come as a (more than welcome) distraction, even if the things themselves were not wanted.

Sigh. Reading those stupid things would probably only succeed in pushing her further towards that line we call 'irrevocable insanity'. And that just wouldn't do – if you reached the 'drooling and insensate' step of insanity, it ruled out all the fun of the whole 'tenuous grip on sanity' deal.

Aiden quickly stuffed the dry intellectual crap in the bag again. If reading one of those books ever sounded like a good idea, she'd _know_ she was bat-shit crazy.

•±¥±•

She had survived all of a day of her twitching fingers and side-long glances at The Bag – the bag that was filled to the brim with oodles of dry, intellectual books – before reading those monotonous and brain-tenderising books had actually sounded like a really good idea.

Yes, she felt bad for her own terrible lack of resolve as well. Not to mention that her sanity no doubt now equated to the dregs left in a coffee cup after you finish drinking it. Atrocious, that's what it was – without a doubt.

But there _is_ something about sitting around without _anything_ to do but contemplate your Impending Doom (either by the weather doing a Dumbledore or the food running out and starving to death – take your pick) that makes muddling through those manuals sound like playing a Quidditch match, or playing a few rounds of 'catch the firsty' with the Giant Squid.

Which really says something about how motivating the force of complete and utter boredom is, huh?

Well, the world wasn't about to start collapsing just yet – Aiden blessed her lucky stars when she spotted a book entitled 'Releasing the Beast: Animagus Transformations' wedged in the middle of a large dictionary on different Runes and how to translate and link them. The dictionary was discarded back into the Bag of Dull Things and she was immersed in the technicalities of growing fur.

She really had nothing to do but take the odd break to eat/sleep/relieve herself, and with everything else never changing, well… lets just say muddling through extremely complex words and descriptions that could have been explained a lot easier was made possible.

When she finally finished the book (and was able to understand it) two days later, she felt better for the experience… or at least a little less bored.

She now had something to do, at least. As she understood it, there were two ways of becoming an animagus. One way guaranteed that you'd become one in the space of a few years or less. The other way held a significantly lower success rate, and a significantly vaguer time line.

Aiden guessed that the first way was how the Marauders and McGonagall achieved their forms, and included a long-winded process of brewing potions to force the transformation interspersed with practising transfiguring part-by-part and building up to the whole thing. That was the one in which you heard about freak accidents and wizards ending up half-horse and stuck in grotesque ways.

But one guess as to who did not have access to those specialised magical potions right now? Huh, if you answered that it would be the Potter caught on a floating pile of wood, then you just won the satisfaction of getting it right.

Then you'd turn to the next option, right?

Well, Option Number 2 was basically meditating on your animal. This worked on a wizards ability to change into an animal – if there was a natural ability and an animal within you, it is said that it will come to the person's call and make itself known, possibly when some unknown set of requirements were met. This one involved an instantaneous transformation, but it was hit or miss – it depended on if a wizard had the ability, and there were no guarantees or set guides as to how you convince your animal to appear to you.

So, she had spent a while meditating, and besides having a bit of fun in looking at the beautiful winter landscape inside her mind, no animal had suddenly inserted itself there since the last time, and she wouldn't know which cave she should start looking in to find one.

An undeterminable amount of time later, Aiden opened her eyes and took a moment to readjust to the darkness of night that had crept up on her while she was 'turned-off' to the world. There was at least one thing to be said about floating on a hunk of wood in the middle of the ocean – it made a beautiful picture of the night sky and stars.

She drew in a breath, then let it out slowly, and took in the peacefulness of the ocean, the dark stillness of the night, and the gentleness of the wind caressing her face and teasing her hair, and drew it around herself like a cloak.

She organised her thoughts and just let them empty; let herself think about everything and nothing at the same time, achieving complete relaxation and tranquillity. Now _this_ was the real reason that she had muddled through those occlumency lessons – to get to this state of being – not asleep, and yet not awake; just relaxed and calm.

It was a weird feeling; just not thinking and concentrating on the sensations of the world.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Being, existing, surviving.

•±¥±•

At her last count, she had been stuck on the hell-boat for thirteen days, a good seven days since she resolved to meditate a little before she went to sleep and woke up every day for the two-fold purpose of searching for her animal and just the plain relaxation it brought. It helped that the state calmed her down and helped her think about something other than the fact that there was only one day's worth of rations left, and that the water supply was mighty low right now.

Boredom had once again driven her into the intellectual books, this time grudgingly picking out the book titled 'Wards for the Mentally Ineffectual' that she had found the note to Idiot Man inside, but was pleasantly surprised.

The book broke warding down to the level that a five year old would be able to understand – it used examples and actual moving pictures of people carving out runes to ward a box, or just carving a rune and pushing their magic into the design – over all, it was at least amusing to look at the equivalent of a muggle 'do it yourself' video but on paper. The few basic runes and the basic methods of drawing them – you could use pens or an actual carving tool to make sure the runes wouldn't be compromised – were clearly written out, as well as the best materials to use to write on (anything from paper to wood to concrete to bone) were included.

Aiden was just happy that it was simple, and was incredulous that Idiot Man apparently couldn't even grasp the things in the book. Well, it was possible his 'master' was patronising him, but something told her it was probably a mixture of both.

Aiden shrugged – it wasn't her problem, the only reason she was even _thinking_ about it was because she was so damn bored. Not to mention using it as a way to distract herself from the fact that she hadn't seen land in the past two weeks, and had only a little food left.

After that book, she moved on to other books – there was a dictionary of common runes, ways to read them and construct them to hold the meaning that you desire – those things were extremely exact, she found, and there was a basic sequence of lines that formed the main part of the rune that you added to in order to 'put on' your instruction. There was another that explained 'linking' – where you would put down a sequence of runes that strengthened its effect and stabilised the magic to make it last much longer, sometimes for centuries.

As far as she could see it, runes could be endlessly useful – sure, they were most well known for warding – creating barriers to keep people out (or in), which was the hardest and most complex of what they could do – but runes were also what enabled all magical objects to operate and continue working, simply because they were equivalent to 'anchors' for spells – pretty much written spells – and their presence allowed the magic to continue flowing, enabling enchantments and spells to last indefinitely – kinda like a magical battery, powering the spells.

Aiden had gotten curious of the duffle bag that contained the books and had a closer look at it, moving it around and examining it closely. What she had first assumed was just an embroidered pattern was, on closer inspection, groups of linked runes. Making liberal use of one of the dictionaries, she deciphered a few of their purposes – there was one for lightweight, another to repel water and protect the inside from any water that soaked the outside, an even more intricate grouping for the size expansion, preservers, charmed 'nothing interesting' suggestions, and a few others that she couldn't understand, even _with_ the dictionary spelling it out for her.

Aiden looked at the bag in a different light after that – who would have thought about _sewing_ runes into something as common as a dufflebag? There were corresponding runes on the inside, mostly to keep out muggles and any thieves (Aiden was surprised that _she_ didn't suffer anything from that nasty group there) and she couldn't help but turn back to the books with a stirred interest, quite apart from the initial 'I am so bored I'll even read crappy books' interest that had been the initial motivating force.

She had managed to use her occlumency to make a new file to sort and order all the new information regarding rune formation and activation, and started going over it during her meditation sessions, managing to eat up more time through the past week.

But what she had been unwittingly drawn into out of sheer boredom and the lengths that she had sunk to alleviate it really had no bearing on reality.

In _reality_ she was stuck on a floating hunk of bark, with very little food or water and the idiot that got her stuck there in the first place and _still_ with no land in sight, nor any _indication_ of land popping up in the distance.

She was screwed.

So, Aiden did what she could – she had stubbornly distracted herself from the ever increasing likelihood that she would _die_ on the pile of logs in the middle of the ocean in the middle of a dimension that she had been rugby-tackled into. Fortunately, it was working well – at least until she paused long enough to feel the stirrings of anxiety in her gut.

She wasn't really surprised when, late that afternoon, she spotted something gathering on the horizon.

Because, lets face it: her luck sucked and she almost expected things like this to happen to her on a regular basis.

That 'something' on the horizon steadily grew and expanded, until the dark clouds were gathered directly overhead and blotted out the sky. Aiden packed away the book she was currently reading (titled 'How to: Rune creation') and stuffed in the maps and books in that strange language that she had found in the 'captain's cabin' along with the scant food rations that was all that was left on the boat before securing a tight grip on the boat's mast – after all, you could never be too careful and it looked like this storm was going to be bad.

So, not twenty minutes later when the sun had set and the clouds broke apart, rain suddenly pouring down from the heavens and the waves tossing the little boat alarmingly around, Aiden held onto the mast and duffle bag for dear life.

Aiden couldn't be sure how long after the rain started it happened, but before she knew it the clouds were roaring with the crash of ear-splitting thunder, lightning arching overhead.

She was soaked to the bone; hair plastered to her face and freezing cold in the midst of the storm, clutching stubbornly onto the wood in front of her. A glance when the boat creaked as it leaned almost too far at some time during the assault made her aware that Idiot Man was no longer on the boat, but there was no time to be worried about that.

The thunder was loud in her ears, the rain was pressing down harshly, the lighting forked vividly in the black sky saturated with the roiling angry clouds. Very suddenly, a wave of tremendous size gathered and Aiden could only watch in sheer terror as it made for the suddenly very small boat.

The wave crashed into the boat, and Aiden was ripped from the mast as it snapped under the pressure, only just managing to hold onto the bag as she was swept off the deck and into the violent ocean.

•±¥±•

A/N: Hey guys, ya – _another_ story. I've had this written for ages (I think since last year) and only decided in a fit of boredom to post it. I will warn readers that any updates for this will take a _long, long_ time, if I ever decide to get around to writing them, although the second chapter will be finished and posted soon.

Disclaimer: Not JKR or EO.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

•±¥±•

Pain.

Not the broken bone kind, or even the sharp and agonising thrill of the cruciatus curse; it was a sadistic mix of the feeling of a 'throbbing all-over' deal mixed with bursts of sharp and targeted pain. Once able to categorise the immediate pain, Aiden was able to enjoy the harsh sting of a raw throat, as well as the fun addition of crusty skin and the stiff discomfort of her clothes that had dried from being tossed into the ocean. Next she noticed that her face was buried in a grainy substance – ah, sand.

Not yet capable of wondering just what had prompted her painful return to consciousness, she tried to say, 'Did anyone get the number of that Dark Lord?' but it came out as a strangled, "Arrrrggh…" instead.

Her left hand instinctively moved to clutch her head, but she quickly stopped the movement when it sent another jab of pain, this time through her arm.

She gathered that fabled Gryffindor Stupidity (or was it determination?) and managed to crack open one unfocused eye but closed it almost immediately after when the light jabbed her retinas, sending _more_ pain through her brain. After a moment of viciously biting her lip to strangle down the urge to either scream or cry – she wasn't sure which she was likely to do first, but instinctively knew that doing either would result in _further_ pain – before forcing open her eye again, relieved when the light was not as pain-inducing as before.

She noticed a fuzzy shape standing over her, but couldn't bring herself to care who or what it was – hell, it could be Tom-bloody-Riddle and she still wouldn't give a hippogriff's behind what happened.

The pain was somehow building, reaching a crescendo inside her body and she stopped thinking. She felt herself shutting down, and she was left with the image of worried dark eyes that had been rested on her by the woman standing over her.

Her last thought, as she welcomed the darkness and the dislocation from pain, was 'stupid dumbledorian weather.'

•±¥±•

The next time Aiden awoke she felt a lot better, and this probably had something to do with the relative absence of pain. Relative in that there was still pain, it had just been dulled to the point that her threshold of pain deemed it as a minor annoyance instead of all-consuming.

This allowed her to examine just where she was.

It seemed that the storm had had one positive ramification: she was now on land. Land. Heavenly, rock solid, trees-grow-on-it _land._

Thank heavens.

Quite apart from being on land, Aiden found she was also in a bed – sure, it wasn't top-of-the-line, but it was quite a step up from sleeping on the deck of that boat and even the broken-spring infested deal she got at the Dursleys. It was simple – there was only the bed and a closet, as well as a few boxes that were labelled. She guessed that this room wasn't used much and had been turned into a storage room of sorts

Her vision was fuzzy, but she was able to see that her glasses were on the side table – at least that was something to be thankful for, even as it affirmed her private belief that her glasses truly would be able to survive a bomb, she picked them up, putting them on and feeling relieved at the sharpening of her surroundings. She was able to scan the room again and see details that she had missed in the initial glasses-less sweep – the duffle bag that she had stolen from Idiot Man was leaning against the wall seemingly none-the-worse from its dip in the ocean. She also realised that what she had assumed to be a bed was actually a futon, but that didn't really bother her – it just secured her assumption that this room (whoever's room it was) was a storage room, which kind of made her feel a bit better – at least she hadn't taken up used space.

Once she moved her attention from the futon, she noticed that there was a large window that graced almost the entire left wall of the room and looked out over a very high cliff. Aiden could just see that there was a beach below – likely the very same beach that she vaguely remembered being deposited on.

Not that she was checking out the surroundings then – but she definitely remembered being covered in sand.

Her thoughts, which had drifted off in the weird realisation that her experience of the last two weeks or so was actually the first time she had seen an ocean _and_ a beach, not to mention a boat not on tv, were dragged back to the present as she noticed a person in the doorway.

It was an old woman – well, she'd guess about sixty, although it was obvious that the woman was still fit and active. The woman had white hair, soft wrinkles on her face that indicated a penchant towards smiling, and kind brown eyes. She had that kind of classic beauty, and Aiden could tell she would have been extremely beautiful in her youth as well. The woman's eyes widened and she stepped forward, pushing Aiden gently back against the cushions, even while smiling kindly at Aiden.

The woman started talking, and Aiden got a bad feeling about her future.

Now, this wasn't the same bad feeling that is associated with imminent death and/or an encounter with some kind of dark creature hell bent on sucking out your soul or eating you for dessert, oh no. This was the bad feeling that came with hearing a language completely alien to your own, and not understanding a whit of it.

Aiden sat there blankly, staring at the obviously kind old woman, panicking inwardly and forcing herself to _not_ show that emotion on her face. She got the attention of the woman by putting a hand on her arm, and she said, "Er… I'm sorry, but I don't understand you."

The woman blinked, and even if they didn't speak the same language Aiden easily interpreted the look of shock on her face. The woman composed herself and seemed to think about something, before pointing a hand to herself and saying clearly, "Obaasan."

Aiden caught on quickly.

She nodded and pointed to herself, "Aiden."

The woman sighed and nodded, smiling. She said something that Aiden couldn't understand, gesturing to the door and miming something that Aiden took to mean something along the lines of 'food' or 'I'm going to get you food'. Aiden just nodded and lay back down; contemplating the turn her life had taken.

The rest of the day went along a similar vein, with Obaasan smiling kindly and pointing out pieces of furniture and objects and giving them names in the language that Aiden desperately tried to remember, which was made somewhat possible through occlumency. She still had no hope in hell of understanding any sentences though, and Obaasan had resorted to miming things most of the time.

Having someone fussing over her, especially a kindly stranger that spoke a different language, was a novelty for Aiden. Obaasan did it in a way that wasn't smothering, like Molly Weasley was so apt to do, nor was it the commanding and threatening mothering of Madame Pomphrey.

The gentle attention and help, so unlike any she remembered being given to her in her life, was soothing for Aiden's frazzled nerves – she was still wired after all the drama of being pushed through the veil, not to mention immediately after that being stuck in a small amount of space for two weeks, and she knew that she had yet to bring herself to accept that Dumbledore wouldn't be popping out of a cupboard and telling her he was bringing her back to the Order headquarters for her own good, or that Dean would call her up and invite her to the Limos District for a meeting with her friends, or that she wouldn't ever ride on the Hogwarts Express again.

She had a feeling she was still in the process of processing the fact that she was stuck in an entirely different dimension (or at least that was the conclusion she had reached on the ship with those maps) and that she would never see her friends or even the Dursleys ever again. She felt equal parts sad and happy for this – sure, she would miss her friends; Susan's witty remarks, the way that she could con Blaise into helping her prank Malfoy, how gullible Anthony was, Fred and George's pranks and mayhem they created with a zealous joy, and that Eliza was always complaining to her about dressing in a more 'womanly manner' – but there was also a huge upside to not being on her home turf; no dark lords out for her head, no Dumbledore trying to manipulate her, no suffering fake friends, no annoying Girl-Who-Lived moniker, no rabid reporters, no Dursleys, and no one who holds any kind of expectations or delusions about her – she could just be herself and not have to worry about donning a mask to placate the masses. Well, once she decided just _who_ she was.

And hell, even if she never did magic again she would be happy – magic has only been a large part of her life for five years, and she had always considered the time at Hogwarts to be somehow disconnected from 'reality', mostly because she would always have to go back to the 'real world' and deal with the Dursleys. She knew how to function without a wand; she could do this.

And if she just happened to work on runes; well, she'd be able to use that form of magic which would just be a plus.

The next day in the house Obaasan allowed Aiden to get out of bed, although she found that it made her body ache to walk around, and showed her around the house, once again pointing out every object and giving it a name before getting Aiden to repeat it to her. Aiden found she could recognise a very limited amount of words they used – pretty much only 'food' and 'water' and 'are you tired?' She found out how to say 'I'm fine' which was 'Daijobu'. That helped a lot, especially because it was all she usually said while recovering.

They also taught her a few phrases that she guessed were 'I'm hungry', 'I need to go to the toilet', 'I'm tired', 'thankyou', 'please', 'yes' and 'no'.

All in all, she considered those the basics (of the basics), and it was immensely helpful to know. Obaasan apparently lived with her family – Aiden thought she'd understood that the younger woman in the house was Obaasan's daughter, and that her husband was Obaasan's son-in-law. There were also three children; the oldest being 11 and the youngest 6, and they all chatted incomprehensibly at Aiden for the whole time she was out of her room. They were all so nice – Aiden had no idea why they were doing so much for her, much less why they hadn't even considered just pushing her out the front door after she woke up, even if they couldn't just leave her to die on the beach (even if she was thankful they hadn't).

It was a type of selflessness that she had never witnessed in action, much less experienced – the Dursleys would certainly never have done it, and if they had been forced to then they would have paraded around the fact that they were selflessly helping some person, and all acts of kindness she had seen in the wizarding world were either because it was a family member, friend or for some political gain. But she knew this family was after neither – first of all, she wasn't famous or anything in this world, so they could get no political gain, and secondly because their house was isolated – she had come to discover that the house was built on top of a cliff that overlooked a beach, and there were no houses in the immediate vicinity, even though she could see a small village when she looked out from the side opposite the cliff.

The adults were talking amongst each other and shooting her concerned glances every once in a while, saying something about 'Akuma no Mi' whatever that was, or at least that's what she gathered as they seemed to repeat that phrase a lot.

The day wore on, and eventually Aiden was persuaded to go back upstairs and go to sleep.

The next month or so passed similarly – Aiden honestly had no idea how the time passed so quickly.

Almost before she knew it she found herself understanding greater parts of conversations, or at least the gist of things; she also understood enough basics to get someone to explain a word to better understand the meaning, even if she was unable to properly compose sentences in the language just yet. She knew that this was thanks to the family – the wife's name was Miyu, and her husband was Kaede, and their children were Masuyo, Shinji and Taiki. Aiden had also discovered that 'obaasan' was not a name, but that it meant 'grandma' and, while she was embarrassed that she had been calling a relative stranger grandma when she initially learnt about it, but she came to be happy that she had been so accepted right off the bat with the kind family.

Obaasan had began teaching Aiden how to read, using (to Aiden's eternal mortification) the simple children's books that were more designed for five-year olds – even Taiki, the youngest, could easily read them. Aiden took the lessons with a grain of salt – at least she was learning how faster than a child, and the books always had objects and pictures that allowed her to learn more words to use in conversations. She learnt that they had three alphabets – hiragana, katakana and kanji, and the Japanese language was made up of a mix of all three. She was in hell, and could not see herself being very proficient in reading or even copying down the characters for a long while yet, even _if_ she was able to spend most of her day attempting to do just that.

She had accompanied Miyu down to the small market on their side of the island many days, helping her with carrying her purchases and watching the interaction between everyone with a kind of fascination – the fascination of the unknown, as most of the conversations were incomprehensible to her.

Fortunately, the family had stopped talking slower just for her benefit – she found that she may as well learn at regular speed – after all, that was what she'd have to learn to do if she was going to have any kind of life in this dimension.

She had decided to put any and all studying of her rune books aside until she was fairly confident in her ability to read and talk this new language – after all, she already knew english, and always going back to that language may have some impact on her improvement in the new language – if she was distracted enough, she may find it harder to concentrate at the goal at hand.

Not that it was all seriousness and mind-numbing studying – she spent at least a part of her day playing with the kids; they showed her games and having fun and kept her energy levels and physical fitness up, and she found that it helped their parents and obaasan when she took them away for a few hours. She was happy to help all she could, and was pleased with her growing speed and endurance that was hard earned from being pulled around by the three hell-raisers.

But even if she had been helping them by being a pseudo-babysitter, she really felt like she should be helping the family much more. After all, she had practically been conditioned by the Dursleys into doing household chores, and even _if_ she had convinced Miyu to let her help cooking and washing up after meals, and doing other odd jobs around the house, it felt like she was imposing upon the family and that they were just too polite to tell her to go away.

This was why, that night when Kaede was complaining about not having anyone to help with some odd-jobs around his shop over the dinner table, that Aiden jumped at the chance to help. They were surprised, but Kaede was happy for the help.

The next day Aiden awoke to someone shaking her shoulder. She groggily looked up at Kaede and frowned, "Don't… wanna get up."

He chuckled but threw a change of clothes at her and said, "Hurry up – I have much to show you and very little time to do it in. We are lucky you are quick to catch on."

Aiden grumbled as she got up but obediently washed her face and grabbed a piece of ribbon to tie back her messy black hair, stumbling out of the room and blindly grabbing some fruit for breakfast out of the kitchen before making her way out the front door.

She grudgingly followed Kaede down the path that lead to the village, but was confused when he lead her past the small grouping of shops that were the only ones that this island contained. He led her around a group of taller buildings and she was surprised to see the ocean. Well, she wasn't surprised the see the ocean, per say; but she _was_ surprised that she could see another island, about 500 metres from this shoreline – there was also a lot of small boats tied onto the beach and docks, obviously used to ferry their owners across the expanse.

While she was puzzling over the fact that she didn't know there was an island alongside this one, Kaede lead her over to a basic small wooden sailboat, that Aiden could tell would just fit the both of them and Kaede's supplies comfortably. He then proceeded to demonstrate how to properly sail the boat, and had Aiden take over on their journey across the water to be sure that she got it – he didn't expect her to be able to sail it straight away, but he explained that later she would have to be able to sail it to deliver orders over to their home island, and unless she felt like swimming, sailing was the only option.

They got over to the 'sister island' of theirs, as Kaede explained it to Aiden, and he lead her through the streets to his shop. She made sure that she could find her way back to the boat, but she was surprised at the thriving shopping district. It was yards more advanced and occupied than the few shops they had over their side, even if it was still under par of what she was used to in her dimension – she found it was most comparable to the wizarding Limos District actually.

She spotted many pubs, hearing lively music coming from them even at this hour – it was barely five o'clock in the morning, so she guessed they had been going all night rather than opening earlier. There were also a lot of stores for different things – a bookshop, clothes stores, leather workers, crafters, jewellery shops, masons, grocery stores, cafes… she could just imagine how many people would be drawn here at a reasonable hour of the day.

She wished _she_ was here at a reasonable hour of the day.

Kaede steered her into his shop and past all the weapons on display. She had learnt a while ago that he was a blacksmith – which explained the muscles in his arms and why he must have had 100 men's worth of weapons in his home, and that he was always 'playing' with them near the dinner table – Miyu threw pots and pans at him when he did that, which Aiden found funny after she got over her shock at seeing how violent the deceptively slight woman could be.

Kaede opened the shop even though he doubted anyone would be there this early in the morning, (but you could never be sure) and showed Aiden around it. He showed her weapons, gave her their names so she could answer if a customer was to ask, and explained that she would be doing deliveries and when she wasn't she would work on the counter at the till. Under no circumstances was she to go anywhere near the forge – that would be dangerous, and it wasn't like she had aspirations of being a blacksmith anyway.

Aiden found that it was nice just watching over the shop – that first day, she wasn't overrun by customers and she spent the idle time struggling through a slightly more advanced children's book that obaasan had given her the day before. She managed to chat to some of the browsers, and only got a few weird looks at her mangled sentences, which she shrugged off easily – hell, she'd gotten worse from her time as the Girl-Who-Lived.

Kaede didn't have to make too many pieces – apparently he was in front in his work – so he spent a bit more time around lunch showing her different items – some decorative and religious items that he'd crafted for those looking for that type of thing, and telling her some warnings and stories about pirates that she only half understood.

He made her go out for lunch, taking over the register for that time and giving her enough beli to get a meal from one of the café's she had seen on her trip through town earlier that day.

All in all, when it came time to close up shop and follow Kaede back to what she had come to think of as 'home', she was happy with how the day had gone, even if she had spent more time learning what to do off Kaede than really helping him, not to mention that she had been roped into even _more_ lessons – just before they started packing up, Kaede was talking about something (Aiden didn't really understand what) when he said something along the lines of "well, at least you know how to defend yourself."

Aiden had stared blankly at him, and he had said uncertainly, "You do know how to defend yourself, right…?" Aiden, being the generally slow person she was had replied, "Oh, sure – I know how to run away."

And at the end of a very confusing tirade that Aiden had managed to vaguely understand, the blacksmith had put his hands on her shoulders and said, "I'll teach you then – ya can't survive long in this world if ya don't know how. Hell, ya can join Taiki and Shinji in their lessons. Teach 'em young, I always say – ya never want ta go without protection round here, 'specially not since pirates stop here all the time! Hell, this is one a' the biggest towns on the South Blue! The marines can only do so much, and not all a' them have our best interest at heart, lass."

Aiden, being the naïve girl she was and only having a tentative grasp on the language, had stupidly agreed.

And that was what had led to her practising knife handling alongside a six year old and an eight year old, both of them far outclassing her. Masuyo, being the oldest, was the best at them but she had foregone knife practise to go over to a local dojo where she apparently trained with her sword.

Now, the art of physically combating someone was long dead (for the general public) in her old dimension except for a leisure pursuit or way to keep fit, so suddenly being drilled by the guy that had taken you into his home and basically being told that you are very likely to be attacked and that you would have to protect yourself when it happened, was a shock to the system.

Because no matter how many Dark Lords and _things_ she shouted spells at, physical training was a far cry from saying a funky word and flicking a stick in the correct way to spit fire at the bad guy.

Not to mention that it was a killer on the muscles and her sensibilities – she found that people on this world, herself included (given proper motivation) were able to move waaaay faster than people ever could on her world, spell or no. They could also train to jump higher, survive harder blows, and generally to a whole different insane level of physical ability.

And all of the training, Aiden would swear a witches' oath to, _had_ to have been designed by a bat-shit insane crazy person.

Because if that person wasn't bat-shit crazy, then she was a hippogriff and best buddies with the tooth fairy.

It was always: 'run faster!' 'jump higher!' 'that stance is _wrong_!' or 'don't let a bit of water push you away!'

Kaede taught her how to fist fight first of all, her fighting with Masuyo most of the time, and getting her arse handed to her constantly by the girl.

When Kaede had deemed her 'passable' in fist fighting, he accosted her in the weapons shop when on a quiet day and made her try out every single weapon in the place – and every single weapon almost managed to end in disastrous results. It was truly horrible, and Aiden was embarrassed that if anyone even mentioned – The Day – then Kaede would start crying or go into some kind of trace, muttering under his breath about 'the horror!' 'Oh humanity! Why didst thou abandon me?' and other such things as that.

She insisted that he was exaggerating – that guy had managed to get his toe sown back on, thankyou-very-much, and if _he_ didn't hold it against her, then the blacksmith shouldn't.

What had come out of that horrifying experience was the knowledge that she didn't suck nor was she a hazard (or as much of a hazard) towards innocent bystanders if she was using a dagger, and that she was forbidden from even touching any other weapon with the intention of swinging it for the rest of her life.

And thus proceeded her training on the dagger.

Building on the insane training schedules to get her 'up to snuff' on her hand-to-hand combat, she was first shown how to treat the daggers properly and how to maintain them – stuff like washing off blood (he expected her to get blood on them?) and sharpening. Following that was how to hide them underneath your clothing, how to quickly draw them in the heat of a fight, and how to spot daggers (amongst other things) on other people.

Aiden had bitterly reflected that it was no secret why Kaede had become a blacksmith – he was of the bat-shit crazy variety when it came to self-defence and all things pointy and sharp. After he believed her able to do all the previously mentioned stuff, he had made her learn how to use them alongside his two sons, both of which did better than her for the first month or so.

But after that, it just clicked. Maybe it was because she was so devastatingly _bad_ at every single other weapon she touched; maybe it was because the humiliation of losing to a six year old was a very good motivator, or even because it was a substitute for her beloved defence class; but either way, she started to become like magic with her daggers.

It had now been a full five months of staying with the Kuroi family, and she had gotten a hold of her life after being tackled through the veil – or at least she didn't feel like she was scrambling to understand everything around her and that she stuck out like a sore thumb among the locals any more.

Those months had been hard – learning the language and how to write and read it, learning how to defend herself from attack, and helping Kaede with his store meant that she was absolutely, hopelessly exhausted when she went to bed at night, not to mention it had hardly allowed for time to get all depressed at how she would never go back to her dimension, that she had left all her worldly possessions in said dimension, and that all she had ever known was also left behind.

But on the other hand, she could not deny that she felt much better for this chance at a new life.

All this time for nothing but work and self reflection lead to a few revelations about herself that she doubted she would have ever discovered otherwise, like the fact that she was a naturally lazy person – no matter how the Dursleys attempted to ingrain a sense of work ethic into her, she had discovered that she would prefer lazing about to working her arse off, not to mention that she was a very hard-headed individual… well, she knew that already, but really never got to win any fights because she always rammed against people with control over herself; and that she was actually very capable in seducing the opposite sex. For the last bit, she had simply never had the self-esteem for it before – but put her in a good environment for a while, allow her confidence to build up, and she was shameless (probably had something to do with always having to be a few steps away from Dudley while shopping or going anywhere really, not to mention the zip privacy you have in a school where guys can sneak into your shower and put viewing charms on the walls) but to her incredulity, it actually worked – she could make some guys go red and splutter, and she spent a bit of time developing the skill during her time working the cash register in Kaede's shop.

She felt like, for the first time in her life, she was a normal teenager. Well sure, she could use daggers, but that counted as normal around here.

If you ignored the fact that she really did just materialise out of nowhere, she could blend in perfectly with the locals.

Whenever her 'training' schedule had gotten to be too much, she would go and sit on the edge of the cliff that the house looked over. That was as close as she could get to flying on a broomstick – the height was vertigo-inducing, and the fact that there were jagged rocks that waves crashed over at the bottom did not deter her. It made for a brilliant sunset view, and whenever she could, she spent that time peacefully curled up at the edge of the cliff.

She knew it couldn't last.

•±¥±•

_disclaimer_


End file.
